Better Keyboard support

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Toledo
Posts: 8

Post by Toledo »

Hey!

First of all!, superb program you've made! I've enjoyed it from the first second! :D

The title might be a little confusing, but what I'm really trying to say:

I own a 76-key piano, and it would be easier to be able to "black out" the keys that a 76-key keyboard does not have compared to a 88-key keyboard.
(Since I'm not very skilled, I'm a beginner, it's a little bit easier to play the right notes)

In the game, with X and Z you're able to black keys out, but I don't really understand the purpose of that... :oops:

Hope my request is clear for you ;)

Greetings from Belgium :)
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Peace
Synthesia Donor
Posts: 21

Post by Peace »

When using the keyboard, the X and Y buttons just switch the octave you currently are controlling. The game still expects you to hit the keys that are in the black areas, so the way it is right now, "blacking out" the other keys for the 76-key keyboard won't do too much good.

My recomended solution would be to A) Try to find songs that don't play notes out of your range, since even if you do learn the notes you can play, you are still missing other potentially important parts of the song, or B) If your keyboard has the capability of shifting an octave up or down, you can do that, provided that the song doesn't require playing notes at each end of the 88 keys. For my keyboard, synthesia recognizes when I set my keyboard down an octave, so I imagine it would work for most others.
~DOMINUS VOBISCUM~
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

Peace was mostly correct. Z and X do shift by an octave at a time, but they also affect how input is read from your keyboard. The blacking-out right now only shows how many octaves you're shifted (in a sort of strange way that doesn't really relate to your keyboard at all if it's less than 88-key). But, if you press a note (say, C3) while you're shifted up an octave (after pressing 'X' once), the game will read it as though you pressed C4.

This isn't very useful for songs that regularly require a range wider than your keyboard, but for the occasional note just one octave away, or especially for songs where you just want to play one very low or very high part, it can be helpful.

To really answer your question though, I have a planned feature that will insert a new step to the setup process where you press the lowest and highest keys on your keyboard. That way, the blacked-out range will be relevant to your keyboard, and the game will also be able to play keys outside your range for you so it doesn't break your combo or otherwise distract you.
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